Your Picotope looks great!
Here's mine. The substrate is ADA Aqua Soil. I'm running two desk lamps with DIY C02. I think the bulbs are each 13 watts. I know, it'll be an algae farm in no time. I'm kind of enjoying watching the riccia pearl like crazy for right now. I replaced the filter with a Tom's Rapid mini canister just because I had it and it looks a bit better.

I really wish I'd have painted the back black before I set it up. It would have hidden the filter, lamp base and C02.

The Riccia mat has filled in and I've added some new plants. I'll get a new picture tomorrow.

Is it just me or is the bottom of your tank different than the bottom of mine?

Actually the tanks (and bottoms) are the same, but since I need to slide mine out from under that shelf to work on it I have it on a special mat of a high tech material made from recycled wood pulp which reduces the friction with the desktop and cushions the bottom glass.

Yeah - that's a load of crap, I cut a piece of cardboard from the side of a shipping box, that's what's under the tank so I can slide it

For the background I went to the dolalr store and got a mirror that was mounted in a cheap 8x10 frame. Trashed the frame, scotch tape around the mirror edges to avoid getting cut, then taped to the back of the tank - now I have a mirrored back! You could always do black vinyl or craft foam on the back.

Dedicated cherry shrimp tank. Originally set up in a standard 2.5g, the new tank let me position the driftwood better, add more rocks and double the plant mass. Xmass moss is finally starting to grow up onto the driftwood and I'm still working on balancing out the open/planted spaces to best affect.

YES! I am using a 3 gallon Mr Aqua bowfront tank (almost the same thing), but I am waiting to pick up ADA Amazonia NEW, some HC, and probably a 12" Finnex Fugeray. But otherwise, you can see that I have the tank, CO2, and the regulator already. I plan to call this project something stupid like PICO-OVERKILL...it's going to be the most high tech pico ever hahahaha.

Here's an updated pic of mine. The inhabitants of the tank are 12 Red Cherry Shrimp. I just picked out some nice red ones from my 60P shrimp tank. Oh and some annoying little snails that have gotten out of control in that tank and hitch hiked in on the plants. They're weird little flat things, meaning they're shells are spiraled like a rams horn but lay flat against whatever they're sitting on. They're like an 1/8 inch across. I'm just pulling them out when I see them for now. I'm thinking about using some "no planaria" to kill them before they end up everywhere.

At first when the Blyxa turned a little red I thought it was cool but at this point I'm guessing it's just fried from too much light. Oh well, I'll probably just pull it out and put some more in. I don't know if you can tell from the pics but on my Riccia rock I've got two different sizes of Riccia. I've been pulling out the bigger branches. I didn't realize I had two different kinds. The big stuff is huge - like ten times the size of the smaller Riccia. I'm not sure about the Vals. The height is perfect for this tank but it's spreading fast and ending up in the front of the tank. I'd like to find some HC or something to make a carpet. It'd look cool growing around the Riccia rock. (like there's any chance I won't neglect to trim the Riccia and it's toupee won't lift off any day. lol)

I need to figure out how much light is too much. It would appear that I've already figured that out lol. I brushed the pearling bubbles off the Riccia for the picture. It pearls so much that the Riccia looks like a glass rock in pictures. I've had two desk lamps over it. Each lamp has a Slyvania 6,500K 13 watt spiral cfl bulb. Each bulb says 800 lumens. I should try just one but it doesn't look bright enough. I need to read up on lighting, lumens etc. I had regular light bulbs in them for a few hours. Bad Idea! Anybody for boiled shrimp?

By the way, if anyone is looking to replace the stock bulb due to it being half actinic, you can buy a new bulb at Home Depot. I bought a 9 watt bulb that is 6,500k or maybe it was 5,500K - either way it's better than the half actinic bulb that comes stock. It was like $3 or $4. Just make sure you get the one marked 9 watt "G23 base". I made the mistake of buying a 13 watt at Walmart the first time but it didn't fit the lamp because it had two little notches at the base of the bulb instead of one notch that's on the 9 watt. I'm assuming that's what G23 base means. It's probably to keep people from using a bulb that's too powerful for their fixture.

I'm running DIY C02 from a 24 ounce pop bottle. I'd like to start dosing dry fertilizers but I need to look at the EI dosing charts and try to scale it down somehow.

I'm loving this little tank. I think it looks so much better than the other nano kits I saw and it's really cheap. Fosters and Smith has it for $41.99 and I threw in some shrimp food to make it $50 for free shipping. If I hadn't had the desk lamps sitting around the stock light and filter would have been sufficient. I want a few more of them now.

I had a LOT of stuff in there. Mostly zoas though. they cover all the rocks very well. I had palythoa, green star polyps, and mushrooms too for soft coral. For LPS i had blastomussa and an acan. For SPS i had montiporas, green birdsnest, millepora, and pocillopora. you will be surprised how much life a 3 gal can support. I had some crazy water turnover though. there was an Aquaclear 70 running on that 3 gal plus the K-nano powerhead.

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